Vexilla: Serial Monoprints with Flag Imagery

I managed to do some organizing today, and while doing so finally signed and photographed some serial monoprint pieces I did at the Vermont Studio Center last March. These are called “Vexilla” (singular “Vexillum”), and are groups of twelve prints, starting in the upper right hand corner and going left to right to the bottom right corner. Monoprints are single-copy prints, but when you pull one print some of the ink remains on the plate, which then can be incorporated in the next print, as a “ghost”. In this way I built up several values of gray as the prints progressed, with more and more layers of ghosts adding to the image. Each new print has just two or three new elements added, usually a strip, circle or star. I’ve always been interested in heraldry, and this is a fun way to play around with the vocabulary. In fact, this started out as a lark one day, and I was surprised by the critical acclaim.

(Sorry about the differing margins around each member for these composites; I wanted to get them posted before I went to the Bow and Arrow.)

Vexillum 01